Russian youths sentenced for 19 hate killings

APRussian young men convicted of murdering 19 people in a string of hate attacks, stand inside a glass cage to hear their sentences in Moscow City Court, Monday, Dec. 15, 2008. Some of the defendants wear masks to cover their faces from the media. Moscow City Court said the two leaders of a skinhead group also convicted of 12 attempted murders received 10-year prison sentences, the maximum possible because they were minors at the time of the attacks. One defendant was sentenced to 20 years, and four others to terms ranging from six to 12 years. Prosecutors said the group videotaped some of their attacks.

MOSCOW -- Seven young men who murdered 19 people in a series of hate crimes were sentenced to prison Monday amid a surge in racist assaults, xenophobia and neo-Nazism in Russia.

Fears of an explosion in violent racism were further heightened earlier this month with the gruesome beheading of a Tajik migrant worker near Moscow.

Prosecutors charged that the group sentenced Monday preyed on Central Asians, Caucasians and other non-Slavs with distinctly dark skin or Asian features, attacking them on the streets and in pedestrian tunnels with hammers and other weapons. The group videotaped many of the attacks and posted the clips online.

Moscow City Court spokeswoman Anna Usachyova said the court sentenced the group's leaders, Artur Ryno and Pavel Skachevsky, to 10 years -- the maximum possible term since they were minors at the time of the attacks in 2006 and 2007. Another man was sentenced to 20 years, and four others to between six to 12 years.

Most of the group -- some of whom were teenagers when the attacks occurred -- stood handcuffed in a glass courtroom cage and showed little emotion when the sentences were read; one of the men smiled and another made an obscene gesture to TV cameras.

The court convicted the group Dec. 2.

Hate-crime attacks are on the rise in Russia, according to rights groups. The Moscow Bureau of Human Rights estimated there were 110 xenophobic murders in Russia this year alone, compared to 74 last year. Sova, a group that tracks hate crimes, said at least 85 people have been killed in racist incidents in 2008.

The situation has worsened in and around Moscow, where 52 racist murders have occurred so far this year, according to Simon Charny, of the Moscow Bureau of Human Rights.

As Russia's economy has slowed and unemployment has jumped, xenophobic groups have stepped up their campaigns, lashing out at foreign workers from ex-Soviet Central Asia and Russia's poor North Caucasus, many of whom work in construction and other low-paying jobs.

In recent weeks, two Tajik men were attacked in a town north of Moscow; one of them was beheaded. Russian media reported his head was found 12 miles away and that an obscure nationalist group claimed responsibility.

On Sunday, an 18-year-old Kazakh student was found stabbed to death near his Moscow dormitory, city police said.

Rights groups say authorities have done little to stem the surge in racist incidents, and prosecutors are quick to classify such attacks as lesser crimes. But authorities claim they are stepping up their efforts.

Charny said the police's efforts are neither consistent nor sufficient.

Defense lawyer Dmitry Agranovsky said the racial killings reflect the state of ethnic relations in Russian society.

"I hope that people will draw the right conclusions from this verdict -- that punitive measures should be combined with educational measures," Agranovsky said.

African-American student stabbed in Russia

An African-American exchange student from Rhode Island was stabbed Dec. 5 by unknown assailants in a southern Russian city in an attack officials say may have been racially motivated.

Stanley Robinson, 18, of Providence was in grave but stable condition at Hospital No. 12 in the southern city of Volgograd, the hospital's head doctor said Friday.

Investigators were trying to determine if the Dec. 5 assault on Robinson was a hate crime, said city police spokeswoman Svetlana Smolyaninova. No suspects have been detained, and she said authorities have not ruled out robbery or random violence.

But Robinson's mother, who has spoken twice with her son by telephone since the attack, has no doubts about what motivated the attack.

"I believe it happened because he is a person of color," Tina Robinson said in a telephone interview Friday from her home in Providence. "It was completely unprovoked."

The stabbing took place in Volgograd, an industrial city of 1 million people 900 kilometers (550 miles) southeast of Moscow.

Tina Robinson said her son had developed pneumonia, and said she was trying to arrange his transfer to a Western-style medical facility. "I'm very concerned about the care he's getting there," she said.

The U.S. Embassy declined comment, citing privacy concerns.

In recent years Russia has seen a rising number of attacks against members of non-Slavic ethnic groups, particularly darker-skinned migrants from the Caucasus region and Central Asia. African students and immigrants are also frequent targets of attacks, but attacks on Westerners are rare.

Tina Robinson said she was unaware of Russia's troubles with racism when her son left for a year abroad. "If I had any inkling that there was any possibility of this happening, I would have tried to dissuade him," she said.

The victim's mother and police gave slightly differing accounts.

Smolyaninova said three men approached Robinson at about 6 p.m. in a dark street far from his host family's home. The assailants stabbed Robinson twice in the chest, she said.

Tina Robinson said her son had just finished working out at a gym and was headed for a bus stop when a single stranger approached and punched him. Robinson punched back, his mother said. The attacker then pulled a knife and stabbed Robinson in the chest and side, she said.

Relatives said Robinson, a graduate of East Providence High School in Rhode Island, was three months into his stay. He was studying Russian on a program arranged by the American Field Service, or AFS.

A woman who answered the phone at AFS's Moscow offices said no one could comment. She declined to give her name.

Tina Robinson said she did not blame the host family.

Galina Kozhevnikova, the deputy head of Sova, said at least 385 people have been hurt in racially motivated attacks this year. According to Sova, at least 85 people have been killed in such incidents.

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